Scott Walker must be sitting in the Wisconsin Governors Mansion pondering how something he thought would be so easy could turn out so badly.
Let me summarize first, then explain why this went down the tubes.
All he wanted to do was reward his friends (the rich and large corporations) and punish his enemies (unions). The plan was ready. Thanks to large ad buys from well-funded front goups, attack ads ran all day and all night. His own ads, promoting his sole interest in jobs, jobs, and more jobs and "getting Wisconsin back to work" presented him as a rolled up sleeves man of the people kind of guy. He successfully delayed the release of a financial report on Milwaukee County (where he had been serving his second term as County Executive) until after the election, but few, if any questions were asked about that, and the ones that were were rebuffed as showing political bias. He dodged and weaved his way through the very few questions about his plans for the state since he had revealed none of them beforehand except for his interest in jobs and not raising taxes.
It worked. He won with 52% of the vote. On top of that, similar huge ad buys enabled Republican State Senate candidates to win in large numbers (it was the first time I'd ever seen a television ad for a State Senate candidate, much less attack ads which ran frequently). The November, 2010 election packed both the houses of the State Legislature with so many Republicans that in the Assembly no Democrat needed to show up for quorum and in the State Senate only 1 needed to appear for quorum. In one election, Republicans had made Democrats virtually unnecessary.
It was all going his way.
Among his first moves was to give an enormous tax break to large corporations ($140 million) while deflecting questions on how he'll pay for them considering the states budget deficit. Shortly after that, late on Friday, February 11th, he submitted his Budget Repair Bill with a quickie hearing by the Republican dominated Joint Finance Committee scheduled for the following Tuesday, and a vote on that Thursday. With less than a week from introduction to guarenteed passage, what could go wrong?
Of course, everything went wrong. An alert, late-working legislative staffer brought the contents of the bill to the attention of a few people, then word spread like wildfire. Unions spent the weekend phone banking and organizing. People showed up in Madison by the tens of thousands. The quickie hearing (no expert testimony, no budget analysis, none of the procedures that accompany even a regular bill) turned into a major event with hundreds and even thousands wanting to testify. The hearing, such as it was, lasted into the early hours of the morning. The vote, of course, was pre-ordained. The Budget Repair Bill was approved on a party-line vote without amendment.
Protestors were growing in numbers as even more tens of thousands appeared. And then all 14 of those uppity State Senate Democrats left the state so the 19 Senate Republicans couldn't form a quorum by themselves. Of course, it easily passed the State Assembly, so massively controlled by Republicans that no Democrat needs to attend, but even that had to be managed with a possibly illegal, seconds only, early morning unannounced vote despite a 61 hour Democratic fillibuster.
We know what happened since. The tactics employed to threaten not only protestors, including the admission by Walker that he had "considered" seeding disrupters into the protests (he didn't because he feared his own political consequences), but actions against the State Senators and their staff members. When major actions failed to bring Democrats into compliance, they resorted to petty, snivelling, childish tactics such as denying access to office equipment, taking away peoples parking spaces, and name calling (I'm proud to be a SLOB).
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OK, enough of the summary of what happened.
So, how did this go wrong for Walker and the Republicans? They greased their machine, had more than enough Republicans to do the dirty deed, and had a media that during the campaign had shown themselves to be sleepy and barely interested.
It was a combination of things:
The ability of the unions to get information out and to organize in a very brief time
The appearance of tens of thousands of people to protest this measure
Unions and their members who supported Walkers election (and were "mysteriously" exempt from being stripped of their own collective bargaining) joined the protests
The politeness, pleasantness, and peacefulness of the protests
The increasing numbers of the protestors day by day
Community groups joined the protests
Media interest in (at last) and coverage of the protests and the reasons tens of thousands were showing up in the cold of February
National media interest due to the unprecedented crowds
The blowback from disconnecting the Legislative Hotline so constituents can't contact their legislators unless they know exactly who they are and have their phone number (the first time in history that this has been done)
Tanking poll numbers
The Fake Koch phone call (Ian Murphy is a hero)
The blowback from Republican pettiness (refusing Dems and their staffers from using office equipment and taking away their parking spaces)
The video of the massive over reaction of the incredible number of police Walker placed in the Capitol to keep protestors out that resulted in attacking a State Assembly Rep trying to get to his office
Most importantly, it all went wrong because Governor Walker, like most Republicans, is largely living in a bubble. He listens to RW media, talks only to political ideologes or to his supporters, looks only at biased polling data, understands propaganda messaging and atmospherics, and believes that the RW echo chamber is large enough and loud enough to shout out any of those pesky facts.
He believed all this would work because those wealthy and corporate donor who put him in office were his "base" and they wanted to strip unions. They had ensured his election and Republican Legislative takeover with piles of cash. Republicans have long wanted to kill off unions to stop the only group that could financially stand in their way to a permanent Republican majority everywhere so fellow Republicans were urging him on. He listened to the same propaganda machine and the same shills that had already brought down Acorn (another thorn in the Republican hide) and had seeded the way with their anti-union and anti-public employee rhetoric and he mistakenly believed that this was the majority view. He fell for his own BS because he doesn't listen to anything else.
I'm sure he can't believe this isn't working. He keeps on plowing forward with the same lies (I talked about the in the campaign - no. he didn't), we're broke (yes, we are, after you gave that enormous tax cut to your friends), and this is a moderate proposal (sure, if you believe that Fox Newzzzz represents majority opinion).
And now, just like he did when he was Milwaukee County Executive, he threatens layoffs if he doesn't get his way, although the number keeps on changing (psssst, Scott, pick a number and stick with it - there's a chance people might still believe you). It keeps getting worse for him despite ignoring court orders and using goon tactics against protestors which went incredibly wrong when they tackled a State Assembly Representative trying to get to his office.
Poll after poll, failed tactic after failed tactic, continuing enormous protests, sleazy legislative maneuvers, daily pressers selling the same lies to a public no longer interested in them, and a media that's not going away (despite his reassurance to Fake David Koch that the media would lose interest) are writing his political epitaph.
I know this clown (I used to work for Milwaukee County before I retired). He won't back down, won't compromise, and won't talk. But those State Senators that don't have a payback cushy corporate job waiting for them post-politics are envisioning their own re-election campaigns or recalls. They, too, see the poll numbers about how poorly this is seen by the general public.
Walker sees himself as a leader. Hopefully, he'll be looking behind himself and realize that he's just a lone guy out taking a walk. It can't happen too soon.